In the early smartphone years, devices used to have multiple buttons both below the display and around the sides. Modern minimalistic designs have done away with most of these physical buttons, thus reducing the opportunities to set up hardware-based shortcuts. The latest Pixels, though, have figured out a way to include a shortcut without adding any extra physical buttons. This hidden but awesome customizable shortcut isn’t enabled by default. The official name of the feature is Quick Tap and it’s a double-tap on the back of the phone.
What is Quick Tap and how do I activate it?
Google started testing the double-tap gesture on Pixels early in 2020, then made it officially available with the Pixel 5 and 4a 5G on Android 11. Since then, the feature has also made its way to the Pixel 5a, Pixel 6, and 6XL with Android 12.